Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 1.djvu/61

 10* s. i. .TAX. 16, law.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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have had the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws conferred on her by the Barrett College, North Carolina, but, shame to say, both college and degree are fictitious. This is a timely illustration of my article in the last volume. There is no institution of this name in North Carolina, but there is one suggestively similar in sound, " Barrett Collegiate and Industrial Institute," at Pee Dee, N.C., under the charge of its founder, the Rev. A. M. Barrett, D.D., LL.D. The Institute has a useful place for its purpose as a school for negroes (Report of the Commis- sioner of Education, 1901, pp. 2318, 2328), or, as said in its charter of 12 March, 1895, " for the education and industrial training of colored people," with "all the corporate powers, rights, and immunities of trustees of similar colleges in North Carolina," including the " power to confer all such degrees as are usually conferred in colleges or universities " (see Curriculum of the Barrett Collegiate and Industrial Institute, Pee Dee, North Caro- lina). As to the conferring of degrees in Europe, Dr. Barrett writes (19 August, 1903) :

" We have a Board of Directors in that country, and we are governed by them. We dp not sell any degree whatever. If a gentleman wish to aid us, we thank him, and as there has been so much said through the papers about the college in Tenn., we shall be very careful, as we have already been."

The source of the lady's LL.D. degree is obvious, and so is its value ; so is also the difficulty of providing against all abuses of the degree-conferring power. There appears to be no limit to the power of this Institute, and an M.D. or D.D. is as easily conferred as the LL.D. The coloured gentleman at the head of the Institute is probably expressing truly his own feeling : " We are struggling to educate the race, and we are compelled to push if we are to make it." If we read between the lines we can realize the whole situation ; but there is no excuse for the State's granting any such unlimited power, or for the powers being exercised in Scotland, or for any one's accepting an unknown degree from abroad.

As I write, the following satisfactory note comes in from the Commissioner of Educa- tion, dated 9 September, 1903 :

" The name of Barrett College in North Carolina does not appear on any of the lists of educational institutions published by this office, and I have no information concerning it. The Barrett Collegiate and Industrial Institute at Pee Dee, North Caro- lina, is an institution for the education of colored persons. All of its teachers are of the colored race, and it does not have any students in college classes. According to the catalogue, it claims to have been incorporated in November 17, 1891, by the Superior Court of North Carolina. It is pos-

sible that the right to grant degrees was conferred by the charter, but the institution is classed as a secondary school."

JAMES GAMMACK, LL.D. West Hartford, Conn., U.S.

" NEW FACTS REGARDING SHAKESPEARE."

Some time ago, in an editorial note appended to a letter in 'N. & Q.,' you stated that you wanted some "new facts regarding Shake- speare," not "new theories about what he may or may not have written."

"New facts" about Shakespeare are so rare since the appearance of Mr. Sidney Lee's standard ' Life 'that I have had great difficulty in landing a fish that will be con- sidered fresh enough for the taste of your readers, but I think I have hooked a likely one in ' Shakespeare's Life ' as written by Mr. A. H. Wall, for some time " Librarian of the Shakespeare Memorial" at Stratford 'A New Biography of the Poet, deduced from Facts as Fire is from Smoke and Flame from Sparks,' as the title informs us.

Mr. Wall took to task Aubrey for relating "new facts" which came within his ken, although " the old gossip " had declared they were " things which, for want of intelligence, being antiquated, have become top obscure and dark." Mr. Wall was specially indignant with Aubrey for venturing to state :

" His [Shakespeare's] father was a butcher, and I have been told heretofore by some of his neighbours that when he was a boy he exercised his fathers trade ; but when he killed a calf, he would do it in high style and make a speech." This was similar to what Mr. Gladstone did at Dalmeny, when he was cutting down a tree in Lord Rosebery's domains. But Mr. Wall calls Aubrey's statement a "fallacy," and for "true biography" substitutes the following :

" In fancy we can see him, while horns rouse workers and the cocks are crowing, stripped to the waist and having a good wash in the pump in his father's back yard. Anon he presents himself to his mother ready for school, and when she has seen that her darling's hair is well brushed, his gown clean, his flat cap free from dust, and his white collar neatly tied, she gives him a kiss and a hug, which he returns with greater heartiness, and then away he runs, having a nod and good-night for the tired watchman as he goes out, and for the coming workpeople many good-mornings. And they all had a pleasant smile for cheery little Will."

As 1 have been unable to find these " new- facts " in the life of Shakespeare recorded by Mr. Sidney Lee, I send them to you in the hope that they may be considered worthy of more extended publicity than they have hitherto received.

Some time ago Mr. Asquith stated that the work of a Shakespeare biographer "is not